Salesforce.com Software Review - Is It Right for Your Business?

Salesforce.com Software Review - Is It Right for Your Business?

Salesforce.com has established itself as a leader in cloud computing customer relationship management (CRM).

Company Background

Salesforce.com was founded in 1999 by Mark Benioff, a former Oracle executive who revolutionized the use of the Web for the delivery of enterprise applications. This on-demand approach is what gave Salesforce.com its competitive edge.

The company's success, which many experts attribute to the shortcomings of early-generation server-based CRM offerings, has been quite impressive. Salesforce.com has been able to earn a strong foothold in the industry, and built a solid customer base of over 92,000 customers.

Customers began turning to Salesforce.com solutions to avoid the long, complex implementations and expensive, time-consuming maintenance associated with on-premise CRM software. Salesforce.com offered a hosted CRM solution that leveraged rapid deployment and simplified administration, making the solution more cost-efficient and IT-friendly.

Additionally, the company's modular CRM software applications and flexible licensing packages allow companies of all sizes to use and pay for only what they need.

What Does Salesforce.com Have to Offer?

The Salesforce.com solution is available as a set of separately-licensed modules for sales force automation, partner relationship management, marketing automation, customer service and support, and business analytics. Therefore, companies can pick and choose the applications they need. These solutions are all delivered via a robust, on-demand platform that can be fully customized to meet your company's unique requirements, and seamlessly integrated within your existing technology environment.

Salesforce.com offers several flexible user license packages, based on the size of your business, and the level of functionality required.

• Salesforce Group Edition allows for basic sales and marketing functions. The Group Edition includes features such as opportunity tracking, sales tracking, AdWords integration, lead scoring and routing, and web to lead capture.
• Salesforce Professional Edition provides comprehensive CRM functionality that allows companies to obtain visibility into the entire customer lifecycle. Mass email marketing campaigns, product tracking, real-time quotes, and forecasting through fully customizable dashboards are just a few highlights of the Salesforce Professional Edition.
• The Enterprise Edition gives larger, multi-faceted organizations a fully-customized CRM solution that coordinates and streamlines customer-facing processes across the enterprise. Large sales teams can utilize territory management, workflows and approvals, and call scripting to immediately improve the efficiency and effectiveness of their sales teams.
• The Unlimited Edition of Salesforce offers unmatched flexibility by providing unlimited access to all Salesforce.com services, applications, tools, and components.

Whether your business has five users or fifty thousand, whether you need end-to-end CRM or just simple sales force automation, Salesforce.com has a powerful, yet cost-effective solution for you.